This project is examining protections that should be afforded to communities in research. It entails two phases of work. In the first phase, existing protections for communities have been identified and analyzed. This analysis indicates that there are 17 different declarations about protecting communities that delineate five broad groups with a total of 23 different protections. These protections are appropriate to aboriginal communities, such as Native American communities, but do not necessarily seem appropriate to other types of communities. The second phase focuses on determining what protections are appropriate for different types of communities. It entails four steps: (1) Delineating the key characteristics that define communities. (2) Use these characteristics to develop a typology of different types of communities. This step recognizes that the term "communities" encompasses a diverse set of groups that are not necessarily homogenous. Seven different types of communities are identified. (3) Delineating the 23 protections identified for the aboriginal communities and indicating the type of characteristics necessary to implement each protection. (4) The different types of communities are linked to appropriate protections through the characteristics that are shared, permitting the definition of the types of protections in research that are appropriate to the different types of communities. The first phase of research has been submitted for publication; the second phase of research is ongoing. This project is completed. Protecting Communities in Research: The following article, Current Guidelines and Limits of Extrapolation was published in Nature Genetics, 1999; 3:275-280.